CuisineArabianBeefMainsMeatRice

Lubia Polo – Delicious and Traditional Iranian Rice Dish

50 mins Cook
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lubia

Lubia Polo is a delicious Iranian rice dish of beef or lamb and green beans in rich tomato sauce. Make this Persian recipe for a comforting weeknight meal

There are plenty of recipes for delicious Iranian rice dishes that you can make quickly and easily. But when you want something that serves as both a main and side dish, look no further than lubia polo.

Also known as: Other names/spellings include loobia polo, green bean rice, and Persian ground beef rice.

Similar to a crispy tahdig rice, this Persian dish features a crispy layer at the bottom of the pot, however it’s potatoes in place of rice. Above the potatoes is a ground lamb or ground beef rice with green beans.

Finally, there’s a rich tomato sauce flavoured with cinnamon, Persian spices (inside the form of advieh), and saffron threads. Those flavours transform the dish into something truly special.

Components of Lubia Polo

The ingredients inside the dish tend to vary through family, and it’s a flexible recipe, so adapt your ingredients to whatever you have on hand. There are three most important steps to making lubia:

Cook the rice.

Almost every Iranian rice dish is satisfactory made with long grain white rice, and lubia polo is no exception. Basmati and Jasmine are my personal favourites. The use of a short grain rice like arborio isn’t a very good preference as it’s more likely to overcook and/or turn out to be sticky. The rice can be steamed, boiled, or even microwaved; the key’s to barely undercook it. This manner, when you add it to the other ingredients for the very last cooking step, it won’t emerge as smooth.

Put together the meat and green bean stew.

The meat for the stew is generally ground lamb or ground beef, however it could also be made with cubes of meat. If you need to make it with beef, pick a cut with a little bit of fat marbling for flavour and to prevent the meat from drying out.

Cubes of sirloin steak or chuck roast might be top notch.

Cook the contents collectively to create the tahdig.

Creating a potato tahdig is optionally available, however it makes for a lovely presentation! In case you want to skip the potatoes, that’s first-rate; just combine the cooked rice and stew in a pot for the final cooking process.

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Lubia Polo - Iranian Rice Dish

Lubia Polo - Iranian Rice Dish

ramsha
Lubia Polo is a delicious Iranian rice dish of beef or lamb and green beans in rich tomato sauce. Make this Persian recipe for a comforting weeknight meal.
prep time
15 mins
cooking time
50 mins
servings
5
total time
65

Equipment

Ingredients

  • ½ teaspoon saffron

  • 6 cups water

  • 2 cups Basmati Rice

  • 2 teaspoon kosher salt

  • 3 tablespoon olive oil

  • 2 potatoes sliced ½

  • 3 tablespoon olive oil

  • 1 white onion medium diced

  • 3 garlic cloves minced

  • 1 lb ground beef or lamb

  • 1 teaspoon advieh or curry powder

  • 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

  • ½ teaspoon ground cumin

  • ½ teaspoon cinnamon

  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt

  • ½ teaspoon ground black pepper

  • 1 lb green beans fresh or frozen (cut into ½ inch pieces)

  • 6 oz tomato paste

Instructions

1
Grind the saffron threads inside the palm of your hand, or in a mortar and pestle (preferred). mix with ¼ cup of warm water. let sit and allow saffron to bloom and draw out as much colour as feasible. It needs to be a deep ruby red.
2
Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add salt and stir. Place rice in a strainer or sieve and rinse with lukewarm water, swishing rice round together with your fingers to cast off excess starch. keep rinsing until water runs clean.
3
Add rice to boiling water and stir to save you rice from sticking to the lowest. Cook, stirring occasionally, until rice begins to upward push to the top and is tender but still has a slight chew to it, 6 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Set aside.
4
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat and add the onions, sauté three mins. add the garlic and keep to sauté till the onions are golden brown.
5
Add the ground beef or lamb, stir within the Advieh Persian Spice blend (or curry powder), cayenne, cumin, cinnamon, black pepper and salt. Sauté till meat is no longer pink after which add the green beans, tomato paste and half cup of water. Stir to mix thoroughly.
6
Cover and cook until the green beans are almost cooked, 6 minutes.
7
In the large pot used for the rice add the 3 tablespoons of olive oil and heat over medium high. set up the potato slices evenly over the lowest of the pot, do now not overlap. This is your tahdig layer.
8
Spoon a third of the rice over the potatoes and then pour 1/2 of the bloomed saffron water on top. add a 3rd of the meat bean mixture and repeat with the rest of the rice and meat combination, making sure the rice is shaped like a cone formed mountain. Pour the last bloomed saffron water plus ⅓ cup water all over.
9
Wrap the lid in a clean kitchen towel and place it in the pot. turn heat to medium low and cook for 40 mins, rotating the pot some times for even crisping, until the rice is tender and fluffy and the tahdig is crispy and golden.
10
Run a rubber spatula across the interior of the pot. place the right-sized platter over the top of the pot and quickly and confidently flip the pot over. There should be a graceful sound of the release of the tahdig. Alternatively, you could scoop the rice, directly to a platter. lightly remove the tahdig whole or in pieces, and serve it on the side.
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